The Academy of Osseointegration (AO) announces that Dr. Stephen M. Parel, Dallas, will be the eighth recipient of the Nobel BiocareBrånemark Osseointegration Award. This award, made possible by a grant from Nobel Biocare, is given annually by the Osseointegration Foundation (OF), AO’s philanthropic arm, to honor an individual whose impact on implant dentistry is exemplary in any or all of the Foundation’s mission categories: research, education, and charitable causes.
“Dr. Parel carried the late Professor Per-Ingvar Brånemark’s message about osseointegration across the U.S. in a series of seminars and headed one of the original training centers in San Antonio,” said OF President Dr. Clarence C. Lindquist who will present the award Thursday, March 12 at 1:15 pm prior to the Annual Meeting’s Opening Symposium. “He is a distinguished clinician, researcher, and osseointegration educator who is quite worthy of this award.”
Active in AO from its founding, Dr. Parel was Annual Meeting Chair in 1994 and President in 1995. “Given the recent passing of Professor Brånemark, this year’s award carries even greater significance, and I am truly humbled by this great honor,” said Dr. Parel.
Professor Brånemark was the first Nobel Biocare Brånemark Award recipient, and his life and legacy will be honored with a special video tribute that will be presented during the Annual Meeting’s Opening Session.
Dr. Parel received his dental degree from The Medical College of Virginia in 1969. He spent one year as a general practice resident with the Veterans Administration Hospital in Richmond, followed by a two-year residency in Prosthodontics at the Wadsworth Veterans Administration Hospital in Los Angeles. He received his Maxillofacial Prosthetics training in Houston at the M.D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute in 1973. He became a faculty member in the University of Texas System in 1975, rising to the rank of full professor in the San Antonio Medical and Dental Schools in 1978. He served as head of the Maxillofacial Prosthetics Division in the Department of Prosthodontics until 1991.
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Dr. Parel is a diplomate of the American Board of Prosthodontics, the American and International College of Dentists, and is a member of many professional organizations, including the American Dental Association, the Academy of Prosthodontics, and the American College of Prosthodontics.
His literature contributions include over 45 scientific articles as principal author, and multiple textbook contributions. He was editor and co-author, with Dr. Dan Sullivan, of the textbook Esthetics and Osseointegration, a landmark reference source for implant dentistry. He authored his second book, The Smiline system, in 1991, and completed a third book, Esthetic Implant Restorations,several years later. He was co-founder of Osseointegration Seminars Inc. In addition to serving as AO president, he has been president of The American Academy of Maxillofacial Prosthetics and the Osseointegration Foundation.
He has received the Andrew J. Ackerman Award for meritorious lifetime service in the field of Maxillofacial Prosthetics, the Distinguished Lecturer and Dan Gordon Awards from the American College of Prosthodontics, and has served as an examiner and president of The American Board of Prosthodontists.
Dr. Parel has served as a professor at Texas A&M University Baylor College of Dentistry in Dallas. He was also director of the Center of Oral Maxillofacial Prosthodontics in the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery/Pharmacology from 1998 until 2008. From 2008 until 2013, he served as the founder and director of Prosthodontics at a private Implant Specialty Clinic in Dallas, Texas. He is presently in private practice, and serves as a consultant to several companies in the implant industry.
Other previous Nobel Biocare Brånemark Award honorees include Drs. Daniel Buser, William R. Laney, and George A. Zarb, and Professors Daniel van Steenberghe, Ulf Lekholm, and Tomas Albrektsson.
